Bradford & Bingley sees profit at top end of market forecast

SimonKennedy

LONDON (MarketWatch) -- U.K. mortgage group Bradford & Bingley
uk:bb
said Thursday that it expects underlying pretax profit for the year to be toward the top end of the range of analysts forecasts after a strong start to the year and continued high demand in the buy-to-let market. Analysts are expecting the group's underlying pretax profit to be in a range of 358 million pounds to 377 million pounds. Bradford & Bingley said it expects net residential lending in the first half to be almost double the level achieved in the same period of 2006. It added there's been a "modest dilution" in margin and arrears levels are up slightly due to recent interest rate hikes. The overall bad debt charge is likely to be in line the with the first half of this year.

Intraday Data provided by SIX Financial Information and subject to terms of use.
Historical and current end-of-day data provided by SIX Financial Information.
All quotes are in local exchange time. Real-time last sale data for U.S. stock quotes reflect trades reported through Nasdaq only.
Intraday data delayed at least 15 minutes or per exchange requirements.